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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 May 2014
In the first number of History in Africa P.E.H. Hair reiterated A.W. Lawrence's plea for a “critical appraisal” and analysis of primary sources for African history. The aim of this brief note is to appraise the originality of certain of these works. The focus will be the Gold Coast, with emphasis on the book by William Smith, A New Voyage to Guinea, first published in 1744 and reprinted (without an introduction or editorial comment) by Frank Cass in 1967.
The literature about the Gold Coast during the later seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries is rich in accounts by visitors, residents, and compilers. Dapper, Barbot, Bosman, Atkins, and Smith all provided descriptions. Only Bosman lived on the Gold Coast for an extended period of time, and the concentration of detail in his book reflects that experience. From about the 1720s to the early nineteenth century, a hiatus in the descriptive literature exists, but then Meredith, De Marree, Bowdich, and Dupuis resume the earlier tradition, so that one cannot say that the Gold Coast has been ignored in terms of European visitors or their original descriptions of the it area.
However, when we look carefully at some of these narratives, we find that not all of what is written is in fact original. For example, Barbot's account of the political organization of Elmina is an exact duplicate, in translation from the Dutch, of Dapper's description. Barbot also copied his description of the “Degrees of Blacks” from Bosman. De Marree, an early nineteenth century Dutch official on the Gold Coast, included without attribution in his narrative, a complete report by Governor General Pieter Linthorst written in 1807.
1. Hair, P.E.H., “Barbot, Dapper, Davity: A Critique of Sources on Sierra Leone and Cape Mount,” History in Africa, 1(1974), p. 25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2. Dapper, Olfert, Naukeurige Beschrijvinge der Afrikaensche Gewesten (Amsterdam, 1676)Google Scholar; Barbot, Jean, A Description of the Coasts of North and South Guinea, [A Collection of Voyages and Travels, ed. A., and Churchill, J., vol. 5] (London, 1732)Google Scholar; Bosman, Willem, A New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea, (London, 1705)Google Scholar; Atkins, John, Voyage to Guinea (London, 1735).Google Scholar
3. Bosman worked on the Gold Coast in the service of the second Netherlands West India Company from about 1688 to 1702. For more information on Bosman and his book see van Dantzig, Albert, “Willem Bosman's New and Accurate Description of the Coast of Guinea: How Accurate is It?” History in Africa, 1(1974), pp. 101–08, and subsequent numbers.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
4. Meredith, Henry, An Account of the Gold Coast of Africa (London, 1812)Google Scholar; de Marree, J.A., Reizen op en Beschrijving van de Goudkust van Guinea, (2 vols.: The Hague, 1817–1818)Google Scholar; Bowdich, T.E., Mission from Cape Coast to Ashantee (London, 1819)Google Scholar; Dupuis, Joseph, Journal of a Residence in Ashantee (London, 1824).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5. Cf. Barbot, , Description, p. 156Google Scholar and Dapper, , Naukeurige, p. 75.Google Scholar
6. Cf. Barbot, , Description, pp. 249–50Google Scholar and Bosman, , Description, pp. 132–35.Google Scholar
7. Linthorst, Pieter, “Memorie,” March 1, 1807Google Scholar, located in Verzameling Jhr. J. Goldberg, no. 177, Algemeen Rijksarchief, The Hague. I wish to thank Jeffrey Lever of the University of Stellenbosch for bringing this to my attention. See also Lever, J., “The Dutch in Guinea, 1792-1816,” (unpublished M.A. thesis, University of Birmingham, 1968), page 25b, note 24.Google Scholar
8. Smith, William, A New Voyage to Guinea, (rept. ed., London, 1967), pp. 2–5.Google Scholar
9. Smith, also published Thirty Drafts of Guinea … Showing the British and Dutch Forts on the West Coast of Africa (London, 1749).Google Scholar
